My Paper-less Challenge, Revisited

Going paperless has been a goal of many businesses for many a year. A goal of mine, too. Few of us, however, have reached that lofty status, but we're getting closer! There are steps we can take so we don't drown in paper!

In February 2011 Active Rain and DocuSign encouraged us to outline our plans to reduce the paper we use. Now they've teamed up again, asking us to revisit that plan and see where we've succeeded, where we've strayed off track, and how it's working for us.

Over 18 months ago I posted, "My Paper-less Challenge: Taking Care of Business in 2011." I focused on 8 areas where I used paper and wished to change. Here's a look at how it's going:

1. The way I prepare files for my clients. In 2010 I started delivering a document disk to clients at the end of a transaction instead of a paper file. I've increased that from roughly 90% to 95%. It's a rare person who now wants a paper file. (I prepared only 1 paper file last year; and none so far this year.) Success!
   
2. How I prepare my listing presentation material. In 2010/2011 I cut down the size of my paper presentation, doing away with extraneous pages. I haven't made many changes here, and still use paper presentations. Hmmmm....room for growth here.
3. My newsletters - in 2011/2012 I've made a concerted effort to migrate more of my clients and sphere from paper newsletters to electronic ones. I'm keeping my printed newsletters to 500 (best cost breakdown) while adding monthly to my electronic database. I'd say this is static.
4. Using paper more efficiently - I'm definitely printing less, printing to .pdf more. However, I've slacked off about printing on the reverse side of paper when I print something temporary for my own use. I need to revisit this practice.
   
5. My efax - this is great. I use it seldom since more and more people have access to scanners and send documents as email attachments. I haven't had a paper fax for over a year.
6. DocuSign. Wow--this is my big love affair! I started using DocuSign on a regular basis in April of 2011. If I had to name the one program that makes my business more efficient, saves tons of time, and saves paper, this is it!
   
7. Paper files sent to the shredder. I now keep only the last 3 years of client files. And the files are much thinner--just working files since all documents and reports are on disc. Each file takes up less than half the space as previously. And the files continue to shrink all the time.
8. Electronic delivery of all financial reports - well, here's where I fell down majorly - most, but not all, still come in paper form.

So, now that I've taken a good look at my practices and goals, I see new steps to take:

• I'll try using my new iPad (another great tool!) to store property tours instead of printing out all those listings. I've already stopped printing out listing copies for my clients since I send the listings to them electronically before we go out.
  
• Our office is going paperless! This is a huge help to me, although the learning curve is a bit steep. PlanetRE.com will be the repository for my files, for the office files, for disclosure documents for clients and other agents. Over the next 6 months I'll be taking this step by step. The capabilities sound amazing--so far I've just scratched the surface
• Once again I'll make efforts to have all financial statements sent to me electronically.
• I'll consider making my listing presentation paperless in 2013--the verdict is still out for me on this one.

Paying bills electronically, electronic signatures, utilizing my iPad, needing less storage space --- all ways to save time and money and increase productivity.